


Daylight

by theworldunseen



Series: jb week 2019 [1]
Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, Jaime Lannister Lives, Post-Canon Fix-It, but they're working on it, everyone is traumatized by canon, season 8 fix-it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-01
Updated: 2019-10-01
Packaged: 2020-11-08 15:20:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,805
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20837699
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theworldunseen/pseuds/theworldunseen
Summary: Jaime Lannister is dead. No, Jaime Lannister was dead, but now he’s definitely not, because he just walked into the Winterfell courtyard. He looks older and slower and thinner, but Brienne recognizes him immediately.





	Daylight

**Author's Note:**

> It's JB week day 1! this is for spring/new beginnings. The primary inspiration is weirdly the very end of The Hunger Games: Mockingjay (the book), and also, the new Rainbow Rowell book, Wayward Son. This has been bopping around in my brain for months, so I'm glad to get it out there. IDK how many of these week prompts I'll get to, but tomorrow is mostly written. So, at least two.
> 
> The title is from this fic's third inspiration, Taylor Swift's "Daylight," the most JB song on Lover. If I stay on top of this, this shall not be the only Taylor-inspired JB fic for me this week.
> 
> A little bit of set up: Sansa is Queen of the North. Brienne is head of her Queensguard. Everyone else is wherever you want them to be.

Jaime Lannister is dead. No, Jaime Lannister  _ was _ dead, but now he’s definitely not, because he just walked into the Winterfell courtyard. He looks older and slower and thinner, but Brienne recognizes him immediately.

She’s standing on the battlements, looking down, and she sees him right away. Jaime Lannister.

She had fought with Jaime Lannister. She had loved Jaime Lannister. She would have happily lived the rest of her life with Jaime Lannister by her side. She had mourned Jaime Lannister.

She cannot face him.

She runs.

But within the hour, Lady Sansa requests her presence. It’s dirty and underhanded — and just like Jaime, she thinks — to use Sansa to get to her.

That is, until she sees him up close.

This is not the Jaime she knew. It’s not even the Jaime who showed up for the Long Night. That Jaime had been on the edge of desolation. This Jaime have fallen into the deep pit of despair. There is no life in his eyes. No hope.

They’re already talking when Brienne arrives. 

“We thought you were dead, Ser Jaime,” Sansa is saying. She uses her queen voice. He nods. “Why would your brother lie to us?” He coughs before speaking, but his voice is still hoarse from lack of use.

“He didn’t know, your grace. I was convalescing with the silent sisters for a moon. They didn’t know my identity.” He neve looks up from his feet. 

“Why wouldn’t Lord Tyrion tell us after you were located?” she asks. Brienne wishes she were anywhere else but here.

“I asked him not to,” he admits, voice small. Brienne almost misses the Kingslayer she dragged through the Riverlands. Sansa turns to her then.

“Ser Jaime has asked to be permitted to stay in Winterfell and work,” Sansa tells Brienne. Brienne nods.

Jaime shifts back and forth on his feet. Sansa breaks the silence. “I told him he could stay if you allowed it, Ser Brienne.”

Brienne wants to run again. She knows Sansa is trying to be  _ kind, _ really. She doesn’t want to hurt Brienne with her acceptance or rejection. But making Brienne choose is a stab in the chest.

“I do not care either way,” she lies. “It is your choice, your grace.” Sansa pouts, seeing through the falsehood, but she nods anyway. Brienne is glad to have a friend. Sansa turns back to Jaime.

“You may stay as long as you work. And as long as your stay away from Ser Brienne.” Jaime visibly gulps. Brienne leaves, even though she should have waited to be dismissed.

Jaime keeps up his end of the bargain. If Brienne didn’t seek him out, she wouldn’t know he was there. 

But of course she seeks him out. She keeps her distance so he doesn’t know, so he cannot gaze upon her, but she watches him every chance she gets. 

She watches him from the battlements, as he slowly helps carry stone that will rebuild one of the many walls crushed during the long night. She watches him as he carries flour to the kitchens. He helps steady the horses. He holds the ladder for a man who’s thatching a roof. Any job that needs to be done, he’ll do it — even if he never loses the dead look in his eyes.

One day she realizes that he’s no longer wearing the gold hand. Instead, someone has fashioned him a hook. She can’t remember if he had it when he arrived. 

She knows she should speak to him. Some treacherous part of her longs to do so, but she doesn’t know what to say. She’s still so mad. She thinks of writing him a letter and slipping it under the door to his quarters, but it would be many pages and he struggles to read. She hates that, even now, she is worried about his feelings, when he never cared about hers. She wishes she could hate him in some uncomplicated way, a righteous fury like Lady Catelyn had for him. 

They go on like this for a moon. Sansa doesn’t mention it to Brienne, which she appreciates. She realizes that she never sees Jaime in the training yard, never with a sword in his hand. Some part of her understands why.

One day she comes upon him planting seeds in a small garden. A young girl is helping him; he can’t dig well with just one hand.

Brienne should walk away.

“Good day,” she says instead. She’s not sure who looks more shocked, the girl or Jaime. 

“Ser Brienne?” the girl says, rising to her feet right away. “It’s an honor to meet you.”  _ She curtseys. _ In another life, Jaime would tease Brienne over this. He would smile, at least. Instead he’s frozen.

“It’s an honor to meet anyone who’s helping with the rebuilding of Winterfell.” The girl blushes.

“My sister will be so jealous that I met you,” she says, clearly forgetting about the task at hand. Brienne picks up the basket of seeds. 

“I can help Ser Jaime finish, if there’s somewhere you’re needed.” The girl — Lyanna — takes the hint and scurries away. She wonders if the girl reminded Jaime of his own daughter, dead now. She never met the girl, though Sansa told her once that she was beautiful and kind. 

Brienne helps Jaime finish planting in silence. They don't touch. Their eyes don’t even meet. Still, it’s less awkward than it could be.

She nods to him when they finish their task and walks away. That night she drinks too much wine at dinner and she finds herself wetting her pillow with tears before she falls asleep.

She finds herself gradually doing more tasks by his side. They tend to the garden. They carry sacks of barley. They rebuild walls. They never talk unless they have to, and even then it is short and formal. “Thank you, ser.” “Yes, ser.” “Please, ser.” It’s better than watching him from afar, but also worse. 

But Jaime is making friends. Sometimes when she’s watching, she sees him talking with some of the other men. Or helping one of the women, who give him shy smiles and warm thanks. She is jealous of all of them, the men and the women, mostly because she can see life returning to his eyes. Slowly, he doesn’t hang his head as low. He cuts his hair and trims his beard. The first time she hears him laugh again, it haunts her dreams that night. 

They pass another moon this way. Brienne knows she’s the one who has to say something first, but at this point there are so many things to say. She doesn’t trust herself to not cry. She doesn’t want him to see her cry again. How can she keep giving so much of herself to a person and then be surprised when it’s thrown back in her face?

Sansa calls her into her chambers a sennight later. First they talk about improvements to the castle, how training the Queensguard is going, important matters. Then Sansa says, “Have you decided what to do about Ser Jaime?” Brienne sputters.

“What I’ve decided?” 

“Were you planning on letting him haunt you forever?” Brienne’s face grows hot and red. She feels exposed.

“If anything I’m haunting him,” she admits. Sansa pours them both wine. Brienne gratefully takes a large drink.

“We’ve lost so much, Brienne,” Sansa says. “Sometimes it feels like none of us should have survived. But we did.”

They finish their wine in silence. 

The next day, she finds Jaime in the vegetable garden, which she quietly thinks of as their garden. 

“Ser Jaime,” she says in greeting without thinking. She’s not sure she has said his name to his face since he left all those moons ago. Close to a year, she thinks. 

He startles and looks up at her. 

“I’m sorry,” he says. 

“It’s fine,” she says, picking up a rake to move the soil. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”

“No,” he says, putting a hand on the rake. “I’m sorry.” She can’t look at him. “For everything.” She nods. He lets go of the rake. “I’m sorry,” he repeats and then he leaves her. She hopes salt water isn’t bad for their fledgling plants. 

She thinks about going to him that night. But she doesn’t want anymore darkness for them. They need daylight. 

She finds him the next morning in the stables, brushing one of the horses. The sun shines in through the window and he looks every bit the golden lion again, for a moment. 

“I cried for you,” she says before she can stop herself. “Every night.” He looks at her. “I was so mad and bereft and I cried until I felt empty and then I cried more and –“

“I understand,” he says, putting a hand up to try to get her to stop. “You’re right to hate me. I should never have come.”

“No.” She’s firm. “You don’t understand. Every night I wished it wasn’t true and that you were really alive. Somewhere. Every night I prayed for a miracle. And then it came true.” Her voice breaks. 

“Brienne —“ She shakes him off. 

“I’ve been throwing my miracle away.” He’s crying. “And I’m still mad. You hurt me. But I love you more than I love being mad. I’d rather have you than my anger.”

And she stands there with her arms crossed. It takes him a moment to realize she’s waiting for him to say something. 

“Alright.”

“Alright?” she repeats. “That’s it?” He gives a little smile and it feels like spring has finally come. 

“Well I had a whole speech about how I don’t deserve you, but I figure that would just piss you off.” A flash of old Jaime.

“It would,” she admits. 

“So I’ll keep it to myself for now.” He lets himself take a step closer. “I don’t know if I can make you happy, but I’d like to try.”

She takes his hand. “We still have to talk,” she says. She pulls him closer. “But we have time.” So much time. He nods, his lips falling open. He’s not the same Jaime. This is a new Jaime — beaten and bruised and hopeful. She imagines he must see the same things when he looks at her. 

She kisses him, their tears mingling together on their cheeks. She is still afraid but it feels right, in a way that nothing has since he left. She puts her hands on his chest and she can feel him trembling. She feels better knowing he’s scared, too. 

“Jaime,” she whispers, trying to soothe them both. 

“I’m never leaving you,” he mumbles. “Never again. Brienne.”

He keeps his promise. 

In four years time, baby Sansa is old enough to help dig out carrots in the vegetable garden her parents had begun. 


End file.
